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(Our thanks to Peggy Pride, who demonstrated this at the 1998 AP Reading.)
Objective
Materials
Set-Up
1 – 1 scissors, 2 pencils, 1 bottle of glue, 2 paper clips, green paper (half sheet), 1
yellow paper, 1 blue paper
2 – 1 ruler, 6 paper clips, 1 yellow paper, 1 pencil, 1 ink pen
3 – 1 scissors, 4 paper clips, green paper (half sheet), white paper (half sheet)
4 – White paper (half sheet), 2 red papers, 1 yellow paper
Instructions
Tasks to be Completed
FOOD: four 3-inch strips of green paper
Follow Up Activities
Ask about the types of resources that each group was given initially.
Stress the thinking process of solving the scarcity issue by improvising. Let students
talk about how the production process was organized.
Did anyone take charge? Did just one person do the assembly of the task products?
Did anyone discover that since the whole sheet of paper was 8.5x11, they could
divide it and use it as a ruler?
Lastly, try to help students to see the connection to the principle of Scarcity as
defined:
NOTES
As later topics are introduced, you can refer to this exercise. For example, reference
to the distribution of the resources can be referred when studying comparative
advantage. The idea of opportunity cost and trade-offs as a part of the concept of
production possibility curves can be stressed in the idea that the groups needed to
make choices about how to produce, whether to trade and what to trade.
This game works well in the beginning of the term when the students need to be
motivated. It is a good introduction to thinking about economic terms.